Wednesday, 16 January 2013
Friday, 11 January 2013
Monday, 31 December 2012
omg!! like kim kardashians totes pregnant?!?!
Searching 'Kim Kardashian' into Google will yield an incredible 496,000,000 results. As to why this is will become perhaps a little more obvious if the internet search is specified to 'Images'. Don't mistake that remark for misogyny or sexism. She has devoted her entire career and adult life to the superficiality and enhancement of her body and relentlessly maximised its commercial (sexual) value.
(There are established rumours that her own mother, Kris Jenner, was personally involved in the negotiation and sale of Kim's home sex tape with singer Ray J in 2003 to adult film company Vivid Entertainment - the inception of her career, and the catalyst for the subsequent television show Keeping Up with the Kardashians.)
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| Kardashian & West |
She has also diversified into numerous perfumes, clothing lines and fashion collections, all the while pursuing a busy modelling career. She is described (in polite circles), among other things, as: a socialite, television personality, businesswoman, fashion designer, model, and actress.
In truth, she is the most successful example of the generation that are 'famous for being famous' - and is frequently criticised for her apparent vanity, banality and vacuousness. (She also did not escape scorn and derision when it transpired that television entertainment channel E! actually advertised and promoted her forthcoming marriage to basketball player Kris Humphries for longer than the 72-days they were husband and wife before filing for divorce.)
At least it can be said of Kayne West that he worked for his fame. His début album The College Dropout is often listed as one of the greatest hip-hop albums of all time. Unfortunately for West, he has yet to contest this initial (admittedly great) achievement. Even more lamentably, it has become apparent that West's likeability and pleasantness is inversely proportional to his musical talent.
Over the past few years he's earned a long and boring reputation for rude outbursts and acts of astonishing arrogance. From claiming institutionalised racism when not favoured for his performances, to abandoning ceremonies when not the recipient of an award ( "I felt like I was definitely robbed... I was the best new artist this year"), to even interrupting the acceptance speech of another artist to hijack the microphone (as he did with Taylor Swift) and protesting at the unjustness of the result. It's certainly true that few public figures can boast of being personally described as "a jackass" by none other than President Barack Obama.
A depraved and pervasive attitude persists among many tabloid newspapers and celebrity news websites regarding women (or more specifically, their objectification) and also children. Both groups are relentlessly exploited as constant (and lucrative) features, stories and articles, but it profiteering from the latter that is so particularly sinister.
The best and most accesible explanation of this complex issue I've yet seen can be found in the hilarious Pod Delusion video entitled "Why The Daily Mail is evil". For example, during the first six and a half years of Suri Cruise's (the daughter of Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes) young life, the Daily Mail published 824 articles - approximately two or three a week - featuring her.
The children of celebrities are often subjected to repugnant persecution by paparazzi and journalists, and this is surely more offensive than the treatment of their adult parents - the child is denied privacy and a natural upbringing before they can understand (let alone consent to) their surroundings and environment.
This trend shows no sign of abating, and perhaps saddest of all, it is apparent that Kardashian and West will only exacerbate it.
Sunday, 30 December 2012
Jack Kerouac and the Original Manuscript of "On the Road"
A few days ago I journeyed out of the beautiful and sedate countryside of East Sussex and ventured into the vast concrete metropolis of London. Having lived in Islington until I was 13, the novelty of endless traffic, the palpable taste and smell of pollution during inhalation, and the monolithic grey buildings is somewhat reduced upon my return visits. However, all cantankerousness aside, London is an incredible city, and it is the sheer vibrancy, culture, and exhilarating scale I am most envious of.
My visit that particular day took myself and a couple of friends to the British Library - admittedly perhaps not the most frequent destination for three teenagers - and we nonetheless negotiated the woefully disrupted Northern line (due to the apparently endless 'maintenance and repairs') with some excitement.
We made our way to the library itself, and after meandering through past some of its countless items and artifacts on display we arrived at the incredible exhibition of the original manuscript of Jack Kerouac's seminal On the Road.
When I read the novel, it wasn't so much the work itself I found so fascinating, rather than what it represents. The Beat Generation is a literary movement of particular interest to me, and it is arguably epitomized by Kerouac's novel, along with that of his contemporaries, Allen Ginsberg (Howel and Other Poems) and William Burroughs (Naked Lunch).
As a spectacle the manuscript is extraordinary. It is 120ft long, and made of tracing paper and stuck crudely together with sellotape by Kerouac, allowing him to write continuously with no need to change the paper, in the three-week frenzied surge of creativity. It is so long, of course, that it is impossible to display in its entirety, and even with the British Library's ample space, only around half of the manuscript had been carefully unfurled and laid out carefully inside a protected display case, the remainder still coiled tightly in a stained and aged cylinder.
The novel is one of the most culturally significant of the 20th century, and influenced all mediums of art. It was incredible to observe it in such detail - mistakes, omissions, corrections, and Kerouac's own idiosyncratic scribblings and rectifications.
This particularly pleasing day was improved even further with the edition of an excellent lunch among great company. So impressed were we by the British Library's absence of an entry fee that, even on modest budgets, we were compelled to donate - not a frequent occurrence for those carefully watching their student loans.
Only one grievance occurred. As we stood around, admiring the manuscript before us, we harbored a wish to leave with our own modest contribution to the enduring memory of the manuscript - a simple photograph or two. Regarding the stern signs forbidding photography or filming as more guidelines, or perhaps suggestions, rather than strict rules we set about carefully and innocuously taking a picture or two on our mobile phone cameras.
We were than tapped on the shoulder by an austere and official-looking member of staff, who instructed us to remove all offending images from our mobile phones at once - whilst watching the screens carefully to ensure we had done so. The notion that an apparently unobjectionable (and low resolution) photograph for our own enjoyment would somehow critically breach any copyright or ownership seems slightly inane, and it did not go unnoticed that this humorlessness was particularly in contradiction to the principles and intentions of the Beat Movement itself.
My visit that particular day took myself and a couple of friends to the British Library - admittedly perhaps not the most frequent destination for three teenagers - and we nonetheless negotiated the woefully disrupted Northern line (due to the apparently endless 'maintenance and repairs') with some excitement.
We made our way to the library itself, and after meandering through past some of its countless items and artifacts on display we arrived at the incredible exhibition of the original manuscript of Jack Kerouac's seminal On the Road.
 |
| The beginning of the actual manuscript |
When I read the novel, it wasn't so much the work itself I found so fascinating, rather than what it represents. The Beat Generation is a literary movement of particular interest to me, and it is arguably epitomized by Kerouac's novel, along with that of his contemporaries, Allen Ginsberg (Howel and Other Poems) and William Burroughs (Naked Lunch).
As a spectacle the manuscript is extraordinary. It is 120ft long, and made of tracing paper and stuck crudely together with sellotape by Kerouac, allowing him to write continuously with no need to change the paper, in the three-week frenzied surge of creativity. It is so long, of course, that it is impossible to display in its entirety, and even with the British Library's ample space, only around half of the manuscript had been carefully unfurled and laid out carefully inside a protected display case, the remainder still coiled tightly in a stained and aged cylinder.
The novel is one of the most culturally significant of the 20th century, and influenced all mediums of art. It was incredible to observe it in such detail - mistakes, omissions, corrections, and Kerouac's own idiosyncratic scribblings and rectifications.
This particularly pleasing day was improved even further with the edition of an excellent lunch among great company. So impressed were we by the British Library's absence of an entry fee that, even on modest budgets, we were compelled to donate - not a frequent occurrence for those carefully watching their student loans.
Only one grievance occurred. As we stood around, admiring the manuscript before us, we harbored a wish to leave with our own modest contribution to the enduring memory of the manuscript - a simple photograph or two. Regarding the stern signs forbidding photography or filming as more guidelines, or perhaps suggestions, rather than strict rules we set about carefully and innocuously taking a picture or two on our mobile phone cameras.
We were than tapped on the shoulder by an austere and official-looking member of staff, who instructed us to remove all offending images from our mobile phones at once - whilst watching the screens carefully to ensure we had done so. The notion that an apparently unobjectionable (and low resolution) photograph for our own enjoyment would somehow critically breach any copyright or ownership seems slightly inane, and it did not go unnoticed that this humorlessness was particularly in contradiction to the principles and intentions of the Beat Movement itself.
Wednesday, 26 December 2012
Bowie & Ziggy Stardust
It's often mooted that the surviving musicians of the revolutionary sixties with the greatest musical catalogues are: Bob Dylan, Neil Young, David Bowie, B.B. King, Brian Wilson, Paul McCartney (ignoring his pitiful decline and considerably irritating qualities). The order itself is of course subjective, although regardless of of incredible contribution to popular music, McCartney is now simply incontrovertibly embarrassing.
Watching BBC 4 (reliably excellent for its informative and interesting documentaries) while slumped on the sofa late one evening/morning a few days ago I watched a fantastic documentary on none other than David Bowie, or more specifically, the truly extraordinary persona he created from himself in 1972: Ziggy Stardust.
Bowie/Stardust was shocking, androgynous, uncompromisingly sexualised, and daring. He was to 20th century popular music and culture what Lord Byron was in his scandalous and much-discussed contribution to the notion of celebrity over a century before, although strikingly contemporary and avant-garde.
Bowie was also musically talented, and his song writing was exquisite. His work was also unprecedentedly intellectual - I cannot name any other pop artistic whose lyrics explore the philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche, for example, as Bowie does in the superb "Oh! You Pretty Things"
The documentary also elucidated perfectly my nagging and persistent doubts as to the validity and authenticity of modern pop music. I've long dismissed it as contrived, cynical, unoriginal, and cheap. As a commentator in the documentary explains so concisely, there is nothing in modern pop music that cannot be directly connected to Bowie and his visionary creation, and citing Lady Gaga as an example, he pertinently notes that she has even adopted Stardust's lightening-bolt makeup.
Whatever your views on the credibility of modern pop culture, Bowie's extraordinary influence is incontrovertible, and recorded admirably in this absorbing documentary.
Watching BBC 4 (reliably excellent for its informative and interesting documentaries) while slumped on the sofa late one evening/morning a few days ago I watched a fantastic documentary on none other than David Bowie, or more specifically, the truly extraordinary persona he created from himself in 1972: Ziggy Stardust.
Bowie/Stardust was shocking, androgynous, uncompromisingly sexualised, and daring. He was to 20th century popular music and culture what Lord Byron was in his scandalous and much-discussed contribution to the notion of celebrity over a century before, although strikingly contemporary and avant-garde.
Bowie was also musically talented, and his song writing was exquisite. His work was also unprecedentedly intellectual - I cannot name any other pop artistic whose lyrics explore the philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche, for example, as Bowie does in the superb "Oh! You Pretty Things"
The documentary also elucidated perfectly my nagging and persistent doubts as to the validity and authenticity of modern pop music. I've long dismissed it as contrived, cynical, unoriginal, and cheap. As a commentator in the documentary explains so concisely, there is nothing in modern pop music that cannot be directly connected to Bowie and his visionary creation, and citing Lady Gaga as an example, he pertinently notes that she has even adopted Stardust's lightening-bolt makeup.
Whatever your views on the credibility of modern pop culture, Bowie's extraordinary influence is incontrovertible, and recorded admirably in this absorbing documentary.
Friday, 21 December 2012
'Heart of Darkness: A Filmmaker's Apocalyspe'
As a young child I was fortunate enough to have a father who regarded film classification and censorship as merely perhaps a little quaint and irrelevant concerning my cinematic education, particularly so if the film in question was of significant calibre and merit.
Unafraid as he was of corrupting my impressionable mind, I enjoyed a wonderful schooling in the works of such contemporary masters of film as Stanley Kubrick, Martin Scorsese, Quentin Tarantino, and Francis Ford Coppola, among others.
I cannot say exactly how old I was when I first watched Apocalypse Now, although I was too young to truly understand it, thematically or conceptually. I did not appreciate that it was an adaptation from Conrad's Heart of Darkness, or its influence derived from Herr's Dispatches - nor even the innate connection to (and exploration of) the Vietnam War, of which I knew very little.
However, I can clearly recall its electrifying, pulsating, primal instincts and urges. It was cinema and film-making at its darkest and most primitive, exploring the most disturbed and frightening realms of the human psyche itself. To watch at a later and more mature age, I immediately recognised it for the visceral and innovative masterpiece it is.
The production itself is one of the most infamous in film-making history - and chronicled superbly in the documentary Heart of Darkness: A Filmmaker's Apocalypse.
Unafraid as he was of corrupting my impressionable mind, I enjoyed a wonderful schooling in the works of such contemporary masters of film as Stanley Kubrick, Martin Scorsese, Quentin Tarantino, and Francis Ford Coppola, among others.
I cannot say exactly how old I was when I first watched Apocalypse Now, although I was too young to truly understand it, thematically or conceptually. I did not appreciate that it was an adaptation from Conrad's Heart of Darkness, or its influence derived from Herr's Dispatches - nor even the innate connection to (and exploration of) the Vietnam War, of which I knew very little.
However, I can clearly recall its electrifying, pulsating, primal instincts and urges. It was cinema and film-making at its darkest and most primitive, exploring the most disturbed and frightening realms of the human psyche itself. To watch at a later and more mature age, I immediately recognised it for the visceral and innovative masterpiece it is.
The production itself is one of the most infamous in film-making history - and chronicled superbly in the documentary Heart of Darkness: A Filmmaker's Apocalypse.
Wednesday, 12 December 2012
America & Guns
As the United States of America yet again grieves and mourns the victims of another incomprehensibly horrific mass shooting, during which 20 children (aged between 6 and 7) and 6 adults were brutally and meticulously slaughtered with the aid of an assault rifle, the international community can only look on once again in bewildered horror.
The tragedy that occurred in Sandy Hook Elementary School, Newtown, Connecticut, is made even more awful by both the utterly inexplicable nature of the crime itself, and the disconcerting irrationality and troubling disconnectedness in the American psyche that has permitted such events to occur once again.
To the rest of the developed world, the culture of weapon-obession and the fanatical insistence of the "right of the people to keep and bear arms" is utterly unfathomable - or more specifically, regarded with such melancholic derision due to the overwhelming moral dissonance between this antiquated patriotic idealism and the galling, deplorable reality which must finally be acknowledged.
A tired cliche it may well be, but there is apparently truth in the hackneyed phrase 'Americans don't understand irony.' Perhaps the most serious and plausible explanation I've heard for this notion is that in its youth and intense patriotism and pride, the U.S.A. is a cultural fledging in its acquisition of the traits of self-deprecation, self-criticism, and derision.
This perceived absence of self-awareness was macabrely derided as I, like millions of others around the world, watched the terrible scenes of anguish and chaos on television. I then recieved a text from a friend that read: "How long before the NRA release a statement saying that if only the teachers had carriying guns they could have brought down the shooter?" Although this may seem vulgar and insensitive, I actually read such comments posted in complete seriousness and agreement across social networking websites in the wake of the tragedy.
It is a shocking indictment of the state of a country so ravaged by such heinous crimes that, even in the wake of yet another senseless and tragic mass-shooting, the President himself cannot even utter the words 'gun control' in a speech addressing the bereaved nation, for fear of reprisal by the all-powerful gun lobby on Capitol Hill.
It is the refusal to acknowledge or accept the sheer intolerability of the problem that is most bewildering to other developed nations - although in fairness, the repercussions of this latest horrific incident have resulted in the most comprehensive criticisms from countless countries around the world, regardless of their socio-economic status. How many more need die before the U.S.A finally takes (lamentably simple) action to ensure such catastrophes never occur again?
The tragedy that occurred in Sandy Hook Elementary School, Newtown, Connecticut, is made even more awful by both the utterly inexplicable nature of the crime itself, and the disconcerting irrationality and troubling disconnectedness in the American psyche that has permitted such events to occur once again.
To the rest of the developed world, the culture of weapon-obession and the fanatical insistence of the "right of the people to keep and bear arms" is utterly unfathomable - or more specifically, regarded with such melancholic derision due to the overwhelming moral dissonance between this antiquated patriotic idealism and the galling, deplorable reality which must finally be acknowledged.
A tired cliche it may well be, but there is apparently truth in the hackneyed phrase 'Americans don't understand irony.' Perhaps the most serious and plausible explanation I've heard for this notion is that in its youth and intense patriotism and pride, the U.S.A. is a cultural fledging in its acquisition of the traits of self-deprecation, self-criticism, and derision.
This perceived absence of self-awareness was macabrely derided as I, like millions of others around the world, watched the terrible scenes of anguish and chaos on television. I then recieved a text from a friend that read: "How long before the NRA release a statement saying that if only the teachers had carriying guns they could have brought down the shooter?" Although this may seem vulgar and insensitive, I actually read such comments posted in complete seriousness and agreement across social networking websites in the wake of the tragedy.
It is a shocking indictment of the state of a country so ravaged by such heinous crimes that, even in the wake of yet another senseless and tragic mass-shooting, the President himself cannot even utter the words 'gun control' in a speech addressing the bereaved nation, for fear of reprisal by the all-powerful gun lobby on Capitol Hill.
It is the refusal to acknowledge or accept the sheer intolerability of the problem that is most bewildering to other developed nations - although in fairness, the repercussions of this latest horrific incident have resulted in the most comprehensive criticisms from countless countries around the world, regardless of their socio-economic status. How many more need die before the U.S.A finally takes (lamentably simple) action to ensure such catastrophes never occur again?
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